Frances McIvor said she called the City of Buffalo several times in 2022 to warn that the large pine tree outside her Albion Place home was a potential danger and should be cut down.
After the pine fell in last year’s deadly Christmas weekend blizzard, the city cleaned it up and carted away the debris.
But city officials have refused to pay McIvor and her husband, William, for $3,400 in damages caused to their Ford Escape, which was parked in the driveway when the tree came crashing down on it.
They said in a letter the city was not at fault, because the damage stemmed from an “act of God,” according to Frances McIvor.
In addition to killing 47 people in Erie and Niagara counties, last year’s Christmas weekend storm, with whipping winds, freezing temperatures and whopping amounts of snow, caused widespread property damage.
About 60 residents and property owners have since asserted that the city should be on the hook for repair costs.
City officials say otherwise. Since January, they have denied more than 20 storm-related claims by residents and property owners. Dozens more claims are still pending, and the city to date has not made any claim awards, according to a city spreadsheet of notices of claim obtained by The Buffalo News through a Freedom of Information Law request. The amount of those claims varies from a low of $75 to a high of $27,470 submitted by the nonprofit organization Central Terminal Restoration Corp.
The total amount of blizzard-related property damage claims submitted to the city is approximately $248,000, although some of the notices did not include a dollar amount.
The city’s Law Department determines whether to pay or deny claims. Mayor Byron W. Brown in 2022 appointed Cavette Chambers, a lawyer in the department for many years, to lead the office as corporation counsel.
Brown said on Thursday in an interview with The News editorial board that his office will “try to help people when we can” with…
Read the full article here